Story Time

Lecture 1, Part 3

Story Telling

A story

  • Here is one you might all know
    • In 1912, Rose boards a ship, where she meets and falls in love with Jack, a poor artist, threatening her engagement to the wealthy Cal.
    • As their romance blossoms, they navigate social boundaries and personal freedoms aboard the luxurious ship.
    • The ship hits an iceberg, causing catastrophic damage and panic among passengers and crew as the ship begins to sink.
    • Jack and Rose fight for survival, facing both physical dangers and societal expectations in their desperate bid to stay together.
    • Tragically, it ends with the sinking of the ship, with Jack sacrificing his life to save Rose, who survives to tell their story.

A Picture of Contrasts

  • Five bullets on a slide vs A famous movie
  • Adjusted for inflation, $1.2 Billion in US box office movie business
  • Quote from Robert McGee (2003 Harvard Business Review) on stories: “fulfill a profound human need to grasp the patterns of living not merely as an intellectual exercise, but within a very personal, emotional experience”

An Outline to close out tonight

  • GOAL: connect your ideas/analyses to your audience’s emotion
  • Suggested solution: the best way - tell a compelling story
  • HUH? Stories allow us to weave a lot of information into whatever we are presenting and you connect to your audience’s emotions and energy.
  • THIS IS NOT EASY TO DO! (practice makes perfect)

An Outline to close out tonight (cont’d)

  • REQUIREMENTS
    • clear understanding of your material
    • storytelling skills to present ideas that connect with your audience
  • RESULT - your ideas are REMEMBERED.
  • If you can capture the principles of good storytelling, then you get people applauding instead of yawning.

If we have time (if not, check Campuswire)

IKEA data

  • Suppose you were interviewing with IKEA or consulting with them
  • Here is some data, I’d like to to examine it with an interview in mind
  • With the specific goal of building a visualization from it (no programming necessary)

A data visualization with a story

  • stories often center on life as it is/was and its patterns of change

Kinds of Data Viz stories

  • There are plenty, to name a few
    • illustrate change
    • communicate understanding
    • purely descriptive
    • poses solutions to a problem
  • Neuroscientists tell us we forget bullet points, but we remember stories.

Some applicable situations

  • We could identify some situations where Data Viz storytelling might apply:
    • Convincing your committee your model is the best model
    • Persuading your employer to apply your recommender system
    • Explaining to a prospective employer the visualization you created for the interview
    • Highlighting problems, finding something of interest (possible solution?)

Reassurance

  • There is NO expectation of perfection in Stats 422
  • Generating data visualizations with ggplot has a learning curve
  • Even if you use ChatGPT

Strategic Storytelling with Data Visualization

  • Keep it simple
  • Edit ruthlessly
  • Be genuine
  • Don’t communicate for yourself — communicate for your audience.
  • The story you are telling is not for you; the story is for them. Help your audience to see what you see in the data.

More on the Audience

  • Always keep your audience in mind. Give them a reason for spending time with you.
  • Think about what will resonate with them and motivate them.
  • Also think about whether and when data will strengthen your story and integrate data sensibly.
  • Make the information presented specific and relevant to your audience.

Advice for Data Visualizations & their stories

  • Even the most beautiful data visualization might fail if it does not possess a compelling story/narrative.
  • A strong story will overcome a weak data visualization.
  • Aim to display data in such a way that makes the complex clear.
  • THE IDEAL - when effective visuals are combined with a powerful story.

Tactical advice on Data Visualizations

  • If someone were to only read the label and title of your data visualization, they should still know what it was about
  • All information presented should be self-reinforcing. The content reinforces the titles. The words reinforce the visual, Avoid extraneous or unrelated information.
  • The decision on what to drop is as important as the decision on what to keep.
  • Outcome based story development (start with the takeaway and work backwards)
  • Ask others to comment/give feedback

GN!